Mobile Number Portability: Not much of a game changer

MNP (Mobile Number Portability) is the service that allows a subscriber to shift from one service provider to another without changing his/her original mobile at a minimal charge (Rs 19 in India). However, it requires a period of four days for completion of porting of mobile number except in J&K, Assam and North East, where it will take 12 days.

In India it has started in Haryana from November 25, 2010 and would be launched pan India by January 20, 2010. It is expected that the MNP effect will be mixture of various aspects in India, because considering the different perspective of present Indian telecom sector, it shows that there will be partial impact of MNP in the market.
The initial reaction of the introduction of MNP in Haryana indicates minimal churn in early days but Haryana circle represents only 1% of the total subscriber base and may not give a right indication. Less than 2% prepaid subscribers and 4%-5% postpaid subscribers in Haryana circle are expected to opt for MNP noting the current porting requests in 14 days. Tata Teleservices have got about 21% of the customers who have opted for MNP while for RCom out of the total movement on postpaid, 80% are port in (those who want to join RCom). In value terms, this is 73% of the total value of port-ins and port-outs (those who wish to leave RCom) put together. RCom has been concentrating on getting only high paying post-paid customers as ARPU in this category is equivalent to 10 pre-paid subscribers while Vodafone Essar is assertive on retaining existing customers and attracting fresh high end customers. Post pan-India MNP launch we might get a better view of its effects on different service providers and 3G launch at the same time would also play important role in MNP,” says Networth Stock Broking research report.
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